Meal+or+No+Meal

== = = =Meal or No Meal= by Renee Cohen

Purpose
The instructional or motivational purpose of this activity is to foster confidence in cooking without recipes for students taking classes in culinary arts for personal enrichment.

Time Required
This activity should last about 15-30 minutes, depending on the number of participants.

Number of Participants
The minimum group size should be ten, and the maximum would be about 30, with the optimal number being 15.

Supplies Needed
The facilitator and participants need to have writing utensils and some paper. Cards with ingredients written on them will be distributed to each person.

Preparation
The facilitator should become familiar ahead of time with several recipes that can be created with the ingredients on the cards. Sample recipes that can be prepared with the ingredients on the cards could be printed ahead of time for distribution after the activity.

Introduction
Welcome to this cooking class. The best of chefs and cooks know how to prepare a meal without using recipes. We are going to try to do that ourselves, so here is an activity to get us started. Each of you will be given a card with one or more ingredients listed. It will be your job to go around the room, speak with others about their ingredients, and decide on how you may be able to work together to prepare a dish. Some of you will have cards with ingredients that are very versatile. For example, potatoes alone can be baked for a side dish, or as one ingredient in something like potato salad. Some of you will need to get creative to join up with others, so have fun!

Process
First the facilitator will distribute cards to each participant. Each person will need to approach other students to see if their ingredients will be compatible in a dish. As students talk with one another, they will form groups by matching their ingredient cards with others so that they can prepare a meal. At the end of the exercise, the groups will either have a Meal, or No Meal.

Variations could include adding a "wild card" to the ingredient cards handed out so players could add something not found among themselves. Another variation could surround a theme for the meal, such as birthday party, wedding, graduation or other celebration.

Debrief
How did you decide if you would prepare a main dish or entree, side dish, or dessert? Did you have ideas for a dish that others found original or unique? How did your own personal prior cooking experience influence or contribute to this exercise? Do you think your cultural background was helpful in preparing a meal with others? Has your confidence level increased or decreased in terms of preparing a meal without recipes? How so?

Credits
This activity was inspired by the first website listed below. Although it really has nothing to do with cooking, it had the word recipe in it, which caused me to think of the concept of using recipes in the lesson. The second website has a very simple cake recipe so that list of ingredients could be used on the cards to be given to the students.

http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/lesson/lesson346.shtml http://www.recipes4cakes.com/favorites/great_cakes.htm